Alyssa Mercante Lawsuit Against SmashJT: Claims and Defense

Former Kotaku senior editor Alyssa Mercante’s lawsuit against YouTuber Jeff Tarzia, who goes by SmashJT, is a federal defamation and harassment case filed in December 2024 in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York. Mercante alleges Tarzia orchestrated a coordinated harassment campaign that produced more than 1,000 rape and death threats against her and forced her out of her job. The case survived Tarzia’s motion to dismiss in November 2025 and remains actively litigated.¹

What Started the Dispute

In March 2024, Mercante published a Kotaku article debunking conspiracy theories about Sweet Baby Inc., a narrative design consultancy that a Steam community group had accused of pushing a “woke” agenda into the games it worked on. She interviewed the company’s CEO and co-founder about its actual scriptwriting work.²

Tarzia, a California-based creator who identifies with the GamerGate movement and produces critical commentary on gaming journalism, began targeting Mercante after the article ran. Her complaint frames his conduct as part of “Gamergate 2.0,” a revival of the culture-war dynamics that engulfed the industry a decade ago. Tarzia also created a Change.org petition to shut down Kotaku and built an online directory called “Kotaku Detected” on his website, listing people connected to the publication so they could be held “accountable.”³⁴

The Statements at the Center of the Case

Two specific statements anchor Mercante’s defamation claims. On March 30, 2024, Tarzia posted on X: “‘Whorification’? What’s that? Like what @alyssa_merc does sucking dicks in her off time for money?” Two days later, in a YouTube video, he said: “Alyssa Mercante . . . has since come forward stating that she used to be a sex worker, sucking dicks for money before working at Kotaku.” The complaint alleges Tarzia repeated these claims across his website, subscriber-only articles, and additional videos.¹

Beyond the sexual-history statements, the complaint alleges Tarzia produced hundreds of inflammatory posts and videos, including false allegations of prostitution and antisemitism, and that his content incited his followers to threaten her. Mercante says she received more than 1,000 rape and death threats as a result and was forced to resign from Kotaku.⁵

The Five Claims

The Second Amended Complaint, filed May 8, 2025, asserts five causes of action:

Defamation and defamation per se, based on the statements about Mercante’s sexual history.
Bias-related violence or intimidation under New York Civil Rights Law § 79-n.
Intentional infliction of emotional distress.
Tortious interference with employment, tied to her departure from Kotaku.
Common law “stochastic terrorism” and prima facie tort, alleging Tarzia deliberately provoked followers to harass her.

The amended complaint also alleges Tarzia exploited YouTube’s algorithm and monetization systems to profit from negative content about Mercante, and that his content targeting her drove subscriber growth on his channels. The suit seeks damages exceeding $75,000 for reputational harm, lost employment opportunities, and emotional distress.¹⁴

Tarzia’s Defense

Tarzia is represented by attorney Ronald D. Coleman, who has called the lawsuit “frivolous” and “baseless” and characterized it as an effort to silence legitimate criticism. In a fundraising appeal, Tarzia wrote that “Mercante has retained activist lawyers with a clear agenda to bring this ridiculous case against me, and the video game industry to it’s [sic] knees . . . This case isn’t just about me. It’s about all gamers.”³

Coleman filed a motion to dismiss on July 28, 2025, arguing the New York court lacked personal jurisdiction over Tarzia and that Mercante had failed to state a claim. The defense also sought attorneys’ fees under New York’s anti-SLAPP statute and argued Tarzia’s statements were “rhetorical hyperbole” rather than actionable defamation. Coleman denied actual malice and denied any bias-motivated harassment.¹⁶

To pay for the defense, Tarzia launched a GiveSendGo campaign called the “Smash JT Defense Fund.” He initially set a $25,000 goal, noting he had drawn from his children’s college savings for Coleman’s retainer. The campaign hit $25,000 in under three hours and nearly $50,000 within days of its December 2024 launch. Tarzia later raised the goal to $200,000; the campaign had collected roughly $82,787 as of the most recent available data.⁷

The Jurisdiction Fight

The main procedural question has been whether a New York federal court can hear a case against a California-based defendant. New York’s long-arm statute treats defamation more strictly than other torts, so defamatory statements sent into the state do not by themselves create jurisdiction. Mercante had to show her claims arose from business Tarzia purposefully conducted in New York.¹

On November 4, 2025, Chief Judge Margo K. Brodie ruled that Mercante’s initial theories, which relied on Tarzia hosting his site through New York-based Wix and appearing on a New York YouTube channel, did not by themselves establish a “substantial nexus” to her claims. But the judge did not dismiss the case. She found Mercante had “pleaded a ‘sufficient start’ to establishing personal jurisdiction,” denied the motion to dismiss without prejudice, and ordered 45 days of limited jurisdictional discovery.⁸

What Discovery Uncovered

According to a March 2026 letter from Mercante’s attorneys, discovery produced several new pieces of evidence tying Tarzia to New York. He had a relationship with a New York-based individual identified as “Crooked De_Light,” who researched Mercante for content Tarzia began publishing in June 2024. He recruited a New York-based influencer, Selmarie Adorno (known as “ToastyWithTheMosty”), to moderate his YouTube, Rumble, and Discord channels in exchange for cross-promotion. He forwarded mail to a New York street address belonging to an associate. YouTube data indicated more than 10% of his revenue came from New York, and Wix records showed the SmashJT site had more than thirteen active applications, which Mercante’s attorneys argue makes it commercial infrastructure rather than a passive website. Tarzia reportedly acknowledged that his content targeting Mercante directly drove his subscriber growth.⁶

Discovery also surfaced what Mercante’s attorneys described as ChatGPT instructions advising Tarzia to “make this as hard, slow, and expensive for them as possible” rather than pursue an alternative such as transferring the case to California.⁶

The Kotaku Detected Directory

The “Kotaku Detected” directory on Tarzia’s SmashJT website catalogs people who work or have worked at Kotaku, with entries listing their roles, links to their articles, and video commentary. Tarzia describes the page as an effort to “spotlight the people behind Kotaku’s content and hold them accountable.” Mercante has a dedicated page in the directory, and her lawsuit alleges it functions as a tool for targeted harassment of her and her colleagues. The directory was briefly taken offline in May 2024 after mass reports to Wix, which cited a privacy violation, but Wix restored it after an investigation.¹

The Anti-SLAPP Question

Tarzia’s motion sought attorneys’ fees under New York’s anti-SLAPP statute, which protects speech on matters of public interest and requires plaintiffs in covered cases to prove actual malice by clear and convincing evidence. If a court grants an anti-SLAPP dismissal, attorneys’ fees are mandatory.⁹ How the statute applies in federal court is unsettled. Federal judges in the Second Circuit have split on whether New York’s anti-SLAPP procedural mechanisms apply in federal court, though the substantive actual-malice standard is generally treated as applicable.¹⁰ The November 2025 order did not reach the anti-SLAPP question because the court resolved jurisdiction first.

Where the Case Stands

As of June 2026, the case is open before Chief Judge Brodie and Magistrate Judge Lara K. Eshkenazi. Mercante’s attorneys have said they plan to file a Third Amended Complaint incorporating the evidence from jurisdictional discovery. If the court ultimately finds it lacks jurisdiction, her legal team has said they will either seek transfer to the Southern District of California or refile there.⁶

The most recent activity involves a motion for sanctions and contempt filed by Mercante on June 10, 2026, alleging that Coleman filed confidential information on the public docket. Tarzia filed an opposition, Mercante replied on June 17, 2026, and the court has not yet ruled.¹¹

1
Courthouse News. Mercante v. Tarzia Court Order
2
Kotaku. Sweet Baby Inc Consulting Games
3
Brooklyn Eagle. Gamergate Suit Between Video Game Reviewers in Brooklyn Court
4
South Shore Press. Former Kotaku Editor Sues Social Media Influencer Over Harassment Campaign
5
Courthouse News. Gamergate 2.0 Suit Not Dismissed
6
Archive.org. Mercante v. Tarzia Plaintiff’s Letter
7
GiveSendGo. Smash JT Defense Fund
8
Bloomberg Law. Gamergate Defamation Suit Survives Influencer’s Dismissal Bid
9
New York State Senate. NY Civil Rights Law Section 70-A
10
RCFP. Anti-SLAPP Guide – New York
11
PACER Monitor. Mercante v. Tarzia